The image crop with the balcony is a bit soft, but the lens isn't sharper than that outside the image center. I shot it at f2 in order not to introduce diffraction and "hide" moiré. I should try to stop down on the same shot and see what happens.

I think the GXR M does perform admirably looking at straight RAW conversions (with RPP, in my case) and no post pro. There is surely a good level of leverage in post and looking at unsharpened images they look pretty good from scratch. I find that the amount of sharpening required is uniform from image to image and not especially light level dependant. I don't muck about with different sharpening for dark/light areas as I find that it introduces more problems than it is trying to solve.

kosmoskatten wrote:
Whoa, I just realize how much Photob*cket kills an image! The shots look way better than this, Photob*cket has managed to recombobulate the image into a mush. Also, whatever that crappy host does it has introduced false color to the blinds to a point where it is clearly visible, as well as the coiled cable.

I desperately need a good web host suggestion, like now please!

Photobucket has an option where it doesn't recompress or resize your uploads. Choose the 1MB file limit.
Picasa has a similar option and that's what I use for images I add in forum posts. My files are completely untouched by Picasa and the exact same amount of bytes as the original file on my hard drive.

Ed: if you are talking about the GXR M mount; I don't know. I've never looked into it.
You can run RPP via a "Hackintosh"solution, either VMWare or Virtualbox, or similar software. I have never owned a PC so I can't comment on how well it does or does not work.

As for now there are some users running RPP on PC by means of software OS emulators. It is a pity the PC users are left out in the cold by not having a dedicated RPP software though. Most people find RPP kludgey to use, for me it works really well once set up. Not much to muck about with before saving the conversion as a tiff file for further work on other platforms. RPP has added GXR M support as well as Fuji RAW support so for me at was an easy decision going with it.

Kosmos; Have you tried any of the shorter summarits? They're supposedly "better" with digital sensors than the older elmarits of similar focal lengths.

Yes, RPP - and a few others - do make a lot of difference. Mind that a raw image is (in this case) some 12 million pixels, and that for each pixel you need to estimate two "supposedly correct" values for the other two channels.
A very fast (but still accurate) edge sensing 3x3 algorithm will need about 20 ops and 4 memops (I don't count register ops, they're so fast) to calculate every new color value, giving you about 35-40 cycles per pixel - times two channels, times 12 MP >> a bare minimum of ~100 million calculations per raw image.

Now go JUST ONE step beyond this, and check a 5x5 grid around the pixel you're currently evaluating, and the amount of calculations increase by about a factor of ten.

The 3x3 grid isn't enough "statistics" for each pixel to get rid of colour aliasing effects, and not nearly enough to get smooth lines (unless you have an AA filter, then it works with accuracy perfection), but a 5x5 - or even larger - will at least enable the converter to get rid of COLOUR aliasing. You can't touch the luma aliasing, unless you go to AI pattern recognition schemes, and then we're talking about hours per image.

uscmatt's images does probably contain a lot more "contrast per pixel width" across the thin lines in the house facade, considering the light conditions. But those images would also benefit from a better raw converter... I don't like aperture, for many reasons. The two things it has going for it are a slick user interface and actually quite brilliant highlight clipping handling.

Joakim; I haven't tried any of the shorter Summarit lenses yet, mostly because I have other glass in those focal lengths.

Yes, I think the contrast in Uscmatts samples were making things worse. I will try to do some high contrast shots and see how it turns out, as soon as the sun pops back out I'll reshoot the same scene. Boring scene, but quite revealing.

RPP does take some time sorting those binaries out but I prefer accuracy to speed. I haven't the time nor resources to go through all current RAW converters to find the very best one. I was hoping someone else could do that for me and report back.

I haven't tried Aperture seriously as there was a lot I didn't like about it when I was tinkering with a friends copy, I didn't give it time though. Highlight clipping is one of the major pitfalls in digital post processing so anything that helps retain highlights is welcome. RPP does that fairly well. Not perfect, but well enough. They have something called compressed exposure which will retain/protect the highlights, somewhat like the "fill light" in ACR I presume.

There is also a Highlight recovery mode, but it does sweep the histogram too far left for my taste.

kosmoskatten wrote:
There is also a Highlight recovery mode, but it does sweep the histogram too far left for my taste.

/ Henrik

Hi Henrik,

One thing you can try with RPP to recover the highlights is to set exposure to something between say -1 to -2 and raise Brightness maybe to 60 or so (You would have to play with both since these are subject and probably camera dependant). You can dial in some pretty decent highlight recovery and "fill" for the shadows in RPP by adjusting those two paramaters. One thing I would say is that the highlight recovery function appears to be broken and can result in some pretty bizarre issues. Sometimes I will enable it just to get an initial value for the Exposure (I often will underexpose more than this value and then compensate by increasing Brightness) and then uncheck it.

Tariq, thanks for the post on highlight recovery in RPP by using a combination of Compressed Exposure Correction and Brightness, which I hadn't tried before. It's a very useful tip and I hope you don't mind if I quote it in the RPP thread on RFF.

I used this method to fix the following picture that was underexposed by about 3 stops: I increased to 3.0 the left field (Range) of the Compressed Exposure field and set the right field (Exposure Correction) to 2.5 and then increased Brightness to 85. Some people will find it still too dark, but that is the look I was after when I underexposed.

Mitch Alland wrote:
Tariq, thanks for the post on highlight recovery in RPP by using a combination of Compressed Exposure Correction and Brightness, which I hadn't tried before. It's a very useful tip and I hope you don't mind if I quote it in the RPP thread on RFF.

I used this method to fix the following picture that was underexposed by about 3 stops: I increased to 3.0 the left field (Range) of the Compressed Exposure field and set the right field (Exposure Correction) to 2.5 and then increased Brightness to 85. Some people will find it still too dark, but that is the look I was after when I underexposed.

Of course not but I was referring to adjusting/ reducing the overall exposure first and compensating with brightness with an image that is properly to slightly overexposed in order to rescue the highlights. As you point out, adjusting the "compressed exposure" in conjunction with the other parameters of overall "exposure" and "range" would work better with severely underexposed images.

One thing you can try with RPP to recover the highlights is to set exposure to something between say -1 to -2 and raise Brightness maybe to 60 or so (You would have to play with both since these are subject and probably camera dependant). You can dial in some pretty decent highlight recovery and "fill" for the shadows in RPP by adjusting those two paramaters. One thing I would say is that the highlight recovery function appears to be broken and can result in some pretty bizarre issues. Sometimes I will enable it just to get an initial value for the Exposure (I often will underexpose more than this value and then compensate by increasing Brightness) and then uncheck it....Show more →

Iliah and Andrey occasionally talk about the concept of "exposing for your converter" and openly admit their RPP, while doing a better job of boosting shadows, doesn't do as good a job as LR with highlight recovery, unfortunately. So, with RPP, they more or less recommend erring on the side of underexposure, as opposed to with LR, where they recommend exposing to the right more.

Thanks so much for that post Henrik, that gives me a lot of hope regarding RPP. I've never given different RAW converters much thought, but now is the time. I'm going to try it out this week, even though it looks like it will throw a little kink in the workflow. I have a few new files from Chicago this weekend I can play around with.

Have you had any more time with your 35/1.2 yet? My next 2 purchases will probably be the CV15 and CV35/1.2. I was really missing the speed this weekend with a 2.8 lens, and I'm still a sucker for some shallower depth of field shooting when the occasion calls for it. I originally wanted to get a ZM18, but they are chronically out of stock and I think the CV15 may suit me better on the GXR anyway.

uscmatt99:
In the recent years I have realized that RAW converters can differ quite a lot. I was complacent using ACR but now I know that the grass has a greener hue on the other side.

I have the ZM18 as well as the CV15, and now the CV35/1.2 so to cut to the chase:

The ZM18 is a little bit sharper all the way, has significantly less distortion (than the CV15) and is only let down by its size. For a full frame RF 18mm I think it is reasonably sized but on APS-C it is a chunky. Handling is excellent and if you ever consider full frame shooting it is a great lens. On APS-C distortion is miniscule and some might consider it clinical in rendering. It is a very fine lens, even considering Zeiss (size) and price.

The CV15 has grown on me. It is very small and light. Build quality is a bit less solid but still very good. I haven't shot the lens full frame but it performs very well on APS-C and it is plenty sharp from wide open. Distortion is evident but not of the unsightly kind and I think it can be used to effect, as Mitch put it. The extra width does come in handy at times and images look more lively than with the ZM18. It will exaggerate perspective a bit, but it can be used to its advantage.

The CV15 does very well on the GXR M and I haven't found it necessary to dial in any compensation for vignetting/color cast. Considering size, performance and cost it is a very suitable wide angle lens for the M mount.

I can try to make a quick and dirty side by side posting for you.

The CV35/1.2 is a chunky piece of glass for sure. I am not sure about this lens yet. It has a nice rendering to and it is quite sharp wide open and needs only to be stopped down ever so slightly to sharpen up better across the frame. On the GXR M it does not suffer much from stopping down. I need to take some people shots with it before passing a verdict. It is promising but I don't know if the APS-C brings it down a notch in wow factor or if it is just me thinking it would serve better on film or full frame.

Early findings is that it works really well on close to mid distance where it renders nicely. Around infinity I have better suited lenses and for really close up work I have better lenses as well. As a people/street/low light lens it might be just the ticket but so far the lens hasn't had the same impact as the CV15 on me. But, it is too early to tell. The evenings when I have had time to try it out it has been dark outside and with only artificial light available indoors and I can't come to any conclusions based on that. Maybe I was hoping for even more "shazam" for the money. We'll see...

I am impressed by how little distortion the ZM18 has, at least on APS-C digital. I've not shot any 135 film with it yet but am tempted to do a few rolls when the weather brightens or some suitable subject or event turns up. On the other hand, shooting it full frame film will only make me yearn for a Ricoh full frame sensor module more... maybe I better not go there.

Definitely it is a chunky piece of glass, especially with the hood mounted. It doesn't feel horribly out of place on the GXR to me and still handles well. I like the feel and placement of the Zeiss aperture rings on the ZM series lenses and focus feels similar across all the lenses I own, even with the comparatively much wider and heavier ZM18.

So far I'm using all my M mount glass from 18mm through 75mm without using the GXR's built in vignetting and colour compensation. It hasn't seemed to be mandatory with any of my optics, but it may also be I've been too lazy to fully examine whether I should or not. I like the former not the latter excuse.

Thanks for the detailed reply. Sounds like the CV15 is a no-brainer for how I'd use it. I'm not averse to a little distortion, and it's other qualities sound great.

I look forward to your opinion on the 35/1.2 after more time with it. Sadly, wide and fast with a sprinkle of shazam is costly these days. In a world without monetary limits and head-shaking wives, I'd order up the 24, 35, 50 Summiluxes and an M9. I absolutely love what I get out of my Nikon D700 and Zeiss 35/1.4, and someday hope to have the same qualities in a smaller format. The good news is that I really like other folks samples with the 35/1.2 on the M9 and film, so as long as it plays nicely on the GXR, I'll probably get it. Large-ish lens, but much smaller than the ZF.2 35/1.4 (830 gm!!!) which is just way too big to use comfortable on the GXR. For stopped down usage, the ZM25 is performing nicely right now, other than the occasional need to stop it down to f/11 until I try out RPP

michaelwatkins wrote:
I am impressed by how little distortion the ZM18 has, at least on APS-C digital. I've not shot any 135 film with it yet but am tempted to do a few rolls when the weather brightens or some suitable subject or event turns up. On the other hand, shooting it full frame film will only make me yearn for a Ricoh full frame sensor module more... maybe I better not go there.

Definitely it is a chunky piece of glass, especially with the hood mounted. It doesn't feel horribly out of place on the GXR to me and still handles well. I like the feel and placement of the Zeiss aperture rings on the ZM series lenses and focus feels similar across all the lenses I own, even with the comparatively much wider and heavier ZM18.

So far I'm using all my M mount glass from 18mm through 75mm without using the GXR's built in vignetting and colour compensation. It hasn't seemed to be mandatory with any of my optics, but it may also be I've been too lazy to fully examine whether I should or not. I like the former not the latter excuse....Show more →

Michael,
Thanks for providing your experiences. My only ZM is the 25mm, and I agree about the handling. The detents on the aperture ring are smoother than on the ZF, but are still well defined, so it's easy to count off the aperture without looking at the ring. Focusing is damped more firmly than my CV SL-II lenses, but still turnable with one finger, and I happen to like the little bump on the bottom. I'm still getting used to the focus ring turning the opposite direction of F-mount lenses, every time I try to set infinity things get blurry None of this wobble I've heard about either. I'd love to try out the ZM18, but as I prefer the CV15 FOV and it is available, I'll probably go with that one. I am completely with you on the full frame Ricoh, hopefully with an awesome revised body, and continue to dream so I don't have to go the Leica route.

Been using the GXR the last few days. The CV15 is definitely a winner. There is a touch of distortion, but around +4 in Lightroom will fix it nicely. But for the first time I have noticed what seems to be edge color shifts. Not nearly as bad as what I get on the M9... The edges seem to go cooler.. at least it's a lot less annoying than magenta:

Henrik, congrats on the CV35 f/1.2. I like it a lot on the M9 and it seems to be good on the GXR as well from my experience. I think your assessment is pretty accurate. I found it took quite a bit of stopping down to bring up the corners for distant scenes, IIRC... but it's a lens I primarily use at 1-5m and f/2.8 and wider, where corners are not that critical. I think it has a bit of field curvature, which on the M9 is a bit of an issue when trying to do an off-centre composition.